


Ritual

by tarokro



Category: Dragon Ball
Genre: Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:41:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24475924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarokro/pseuds/tarokro
Summary: A private ritual, for their eyes only.
Relationships: Son Goku/Vegeta (Dragon Ball)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 56





	Ritual

He’s burning.

There’s pain shooting through his calf, rooted at his ankle and spiralling out and up. The muscles in his leg scream their protest as he leans to his side; his jaw is spared the full force of the punch that soars past, only clipping his chin as he sidesteps to a leap. His neck tenses painfully as he jumps, and he can feel something in his back spasming as he powers on ahead. He hears Goku grunt beneath him, hears the telltale crackle of his energy as he powers up to follow.

Vegeta allows himself the chance to retreat; he soars ahead, dips beneath the craggy valley and along the rough cliff that demarks its boundary with the forest as he weaves between tree after tree. He takes that time to breathe, to feel the pain that blooms in his chest with every inhale. He’s hyper-aware of every ki point around him, of every source of life that he passes in the thicket of trees that surrounds him; he can feel every deer that runs, every tree he blitzes past, even beneath the massive surge of ki that is the other Saiyan behind him.

He feels alive.

Their bouts are like this more and more frequently, intentionally or not. Fights without ki blasts or power-ups: it’s become a ritual, something wordless that’s passed between them before a spar when the mood calls for it. It’s their Saiyan nature, something wild and feral that simmers within the very fibre of their being. It’s difficult to resist, a hungry, impatient thing that claws at his chest at the sight of blood and demands more and more. It’s an instinct down to their innate ability to transform into the Great Ape, something children are taught to control, something that every Saiyan wills into a manageable desire for violence without letting them become little more than an animal. That, Vegeta thinks, flying low above tree roots and soil, is why it feels so satisfying to give into it: letting it consume him is a taboo and a relief, an embrace and rejection of his culture and his nature, and the contentment that fills him with every spar in such a state is incentive enough to continue.

He takes his chance at a gnarled, old oak, letting himself land and feeling the crunch of withering roots beneath his boots as he digs his heels into the ground. He has seconds to react, and Goku plays right into his hands; Vegeta watches as the younger of them sweeps to avoid the tree, his back facing him, and he chooses then to strike. He digs the ball of his bad foot into the soil, ki burning beneath his skin with sheer anticipation, and twists himself to drive his knee forward.

The contact feels electric, and the seconds that it lasts feel like a lifetime. There’s a bloodthirsty sort of satisfaction that fills him with the way Goku contorts around his leg, his spine bending painfully around him as he drives his knee further and further up. Vegeta hears something animalistic bubbling in his throat as he drives his knee higher, ignoring the searing pain in his back leg as he watches the spittle and blood leave his opponent’s mouth while he moves. Goku’s eyes are glazed over with pain and wide with surprise, and another surge of primal glee overtakes Vegeta as he moves.

It’s with that thought that he lets it out, some sort of primal roar leaving him as ki flows through his body and he leaves the ground. The impact drives Goku up high, crashing into branch after branch as Vegeta follows close behind. He manages to push forward with another punch, sloppy in its placement, but hears a sickening crack as his fist connects with Goku’s shoulder. He uses the contact to push the other man higher, another near-growl escaping him as he surges forward and watches Goku fly higher and higher from the contact with his fist alone. The pained howl that leaves him is music to Vegeta’s ears, and something else curls within him as he realises that he wants to hear it again.

The wind thunders in his ears as he wills himself to move faster. His body moves on instinct—he doesn’t know what he’s trying to do until he’s in the midst of it, pushing himself to fly higher and higher with a sudden tingling in his elbow. There’s a sudden urge in Vegeta’s mind to slam Goku downward, to watch him crash down to the ground and watch the rebound of his body as it collides brutally with the earth. In the jumble of those thoughts of  _ hurt him _ and  _ hit him _ and  _ hit  _ **_harder_ ** is something wilder, something he usually doesn’t dare to entertain. It’s one of those thoughts that distracts him; it’s in his mind for less than a second, but it’s enough for him to take his focus off of the man next to him, and Vegeta hears a sickening crack as something connects with his neck.

He’s launched to the side, or something like it; his vision is blurred for what seems like minutes as he tries to refocus, his skull throbbing with the attempt. He’s hovering low enough that he can feel himself connecting with trees, the momentum from Goku’s impact still carrying him. Vegeta shakes his head, ignoring the protesting pain in his head as his vision clears; he’s conscious quickly enough that he just about slows himself down before he collides with the cliffside behind him, its form giving way for his body to leave a crater nestled in the surface of the rock.

The impact winds him; he can taste metal in the back of his throat as blood spatters forward, his head slamming back against the rock behind him before he slumps forward. The pounding in his skull is relentless, even in the brief calm he’s allowed in the crater, and something near his shoulder has definitely been moved out of place. Adrenaline and will alone are keeping his ankle going, and he can feel the trickle of blood down his forehead as he tries to push himself up.

Something akin to contentment curls in his belly.

He’s pushed himself up to all fours by the time Goku reaches him, his fingers splayed wide and his knees digging into the rock beneath him. Vegeta looks up and watches him—he’s hovering just outside the crater, his shoulders tight and drawn back, blood trickling down in rivulets from a wide gash in his forehead. His expression is guarded, his brows knitted to look serious, but he doesn’t move even as the corner of his lip quirks into a smirk. It’s something all too familiar—he’s waiting for Vegeta to give into the urge to attack. Goku knows that he hates it when he does it, knows that his pride is tied up in pressing onward ‘til death rather than giving in.

Vegeta knows him just as well.

He moves forward without a word, no named attack to yell and no kiai to accompany it. He pushes off of the ball of his good foot and flies, twisting himself so that he comes parallel to the walls of the cave as he lets his energy float him up. He pulls a hand back as though to punch, and a devious grin spreads along his face as he sees Goku pitch back and downward. He’s just beneath the surface of the crater, parallel to the ground of it, anticipating Vegeta’s full commitment to the movement so he can catch him unawares; he doesn’t expect Vegeta to grasp him by the feet and  _ swing, _ clubbing him into the jagged surface of the cliff.

He makes his next move quickly: he lifts himself upward and swings Goku to the side, his head connecting with the ceiling of the crater. It’s with that movement that he begins to drag him fully, propelling himself up the cliff and dragging Goku through the earth beside him. A sick satisfaction fills him as he moves, rock and rubble trailing behind him as he carves the cliff with Goku’s body. The flight from the crater to the clifftop takes seconds, but the bloodlust that’s slowly sated in his belly with each crumbling rock makes it feel like a lifetime.

It’s as he lifts Goku through and out of the clifftop to throw him skyward that Vegeta’s gaze falls on his neck, his head tilted as though baring it to him in offering. That’s all the distraction he needs; he can’t make out Goku’s expression, his face caked in dirt and smeared with his own blood, but he’s sure there’s something wickedly smug as Goku’s hands catch on the flat surface of the valley beyond the cliff and he pushes himself onto it. The rest happens quickly, a blur of humiliation that Vegeta can blame entirely on his own incompetence. He watches Goku splay his fingers wide against the clifftop, and Vegeta barely has time to process the flip that the other man enters before his face makes contact with the ground beneath him.

That’s what does it. His brain rattles in his skull as his head slams into the bare rock beneath him, something bordering on nausea curdling in the pit of his stomach as he rolls to rest on his good shoulder. Every fibre of his being screams at him to stop, and it’s only as he notices the inhuman angle at which his wrist is bent when he opens his eyes that he decides that he’s finished. He lifts his gaze upwards and finds Goku looming over him, that same challenging expression on his face as he squared his shoulders. Blood spills from several gashes along his torso, getting smaller and smaller up to the thin cuts along his face. There’s dirt caked in his hair and patches missing from his gi, new ones and holes where previous patches have torn at the seams; the top half is missing altogether.  _ Keep pushing, _ he says, his eyes narrowed and expectant.  _ I’m waiting. _

Something in the background briefly catches his attention, the sound dulled to Vegeta’s senses as Goku looks up and ahead. His next action comes on impulse, a true return to form for their constant rivalry: taking stock of Goku’s distraction, Vegeta lets a small ball of ki manifest and throws it, satisfied when it hits him square in the head and the younger man falls back next to him with a thud.

“Cheater,” Goku says immediately. His voice is hoarse as he speaks from the ground, perpendicular to where Vegeta lies, half of his body on rock and the other on the flattened grass of the valley. Vegeta doesn’t dignify him with a response; he rolls onto his back instead, one leg bent with his foot against the earth and the other stretched long as he surveys his bum wrist. He’s pressed against the steady incline of a small cliff on his right as he lets his eyes scan the sky, taking in the orange hues of the evening. He tilts his head up slightly, craning to look behind him; past the cliff, the sun barely peeks over the horizon, content to let the daytime end in its absence.

“Senzu,” he says, and he’s briefly surprised by the harsh rasp of his voice. His gaze is still trained skyward as he hears shuffling at his side; when he finally turns to face it, Goku is a footstep away from him, his head cradled against his arm as he lies on his side. The grotty, weathered senzu pouch is tucked against his now-bare chest, and the brief moment that Vegeta takes to look at it is all it takes for Goku to flick a senzu right at his forehead.

“That’s for cheatin’,” Goku says, and Vegeta sneers at the cheeky grin along his face as he shifts to pick it up with his good hand. He pops it in a second later, and the immediate relief that floods him as he bites into it is enough that he lets out a satisfied grunt. It’s enough that he can shift his position, pushing himself up so that his back rests against the cliff beside him, and he uses the position to take hold of his bad wrist and push. It realigns without much trouble, and he rotates it in quick circles as he surveys his twisted ankle. He watches as Goku sits up to survey his knee, the other man’s hands reaching for it as he bites down on the bean in his mouth.

It’s easy enough to check the rest of his body over. His ankle is easy to shift back into place, though he can’t help but hiss at the awful  _ pop _ that accompanies the pain as he relocates it. The senzu does the rest—Vegeta can feel the cuts along his brow sealing effortlessly, and his shattered ankle is healed enough that he can draw his feet in to sit cross-legged. The motions are all too familiar, another stage in the strange ritual they’ve formed between them: a calm end to a frenzied start, Goku’s eyes are trained on him curiously, his stomach flush with his thighs as his hands grip the outsoles of his boots to stretch. The sun dips lower on the horizon to his left, the rocky edge of the valley bathed in orange and blue; straight ahead, he can see the ocean, near glittering in the evening light. 

“Your shoulder’s still off,” he says, his cheek pressed against his knee. Vegeta tests his right shoulder; it’s painless, but it’s most certainly out of place, and it’s pushed out to the back in a way that he can’t quite correct on his own. Goku moves wordlessly, bringing himself to kneel at Vegeta’s side before bracing a hand against the older man’s chest where his battle suit is ripped, pushing him against the mountainous wall behind them. He cups his other hand around Vegeta’s shoulder and pulls, another  _ pop _ sounding as the joint sets. Goku laughs at the noise, his fingers splayed wide against Vegeta’s chest as he shifts to sit cross-legged.

The boundaries are different here, wherever and whenever they decide to spar, so Vegeta stays still, and he lets Goku look at him and touch as he’d like. He stands out stark against the background behind him, dark hair and dark eyes and sun-tanned skin against the orange hues above the ocean. His face is still a mess of dirt and dried blood, and Vegeta lifts a hand to swipe at his brow, watching the dirt smear and the blood crack off of his skin. His movement gets no more reaction than the quick quirk of Goku’s brow, and the younger man’s hand moves up to his neck, his thumb tracing along Vegeta’s collarbone.

“Y’know,” Goku says, his expression oddly fond, “I thought I’d broken your neck back there.”

“Try harder next time,” Vegeta replies. It gets Goku laughing, his smile wide as Vegeta moves his hand to his hair. Gloved fingers move to separate dirt-caked strands from each other, and even with the awful mess of dirt on his face and the tangles in his hair, Goku seems content. “You look like shit,” Vegeta states, his fingers fighting with a knot as Goku scrunches up his face.

Rough hands bat away at his moments later, and Goku shakes his head as though willing the tangles back into his hair. “You look worse,” Goku says, as though it’s factual. Vegeta snorts.

As the sun dips lower and the sky darkens, Goku sidles up next to him, one leg bent and pressed against Vegeta’s knee while the other lays long. They’re shoulder-to-shoulder, and at some point Goku’s hand finds his in his lap, restless and fidgety against Vegeta’s stillness. Goku’s head droops to the side, eventually, and Vegeta tenses but doesn’t move; he lets the younger man rest against him without much issue, only interrupting to flick at his wrist in his lap and grunt at Goku’s whine of pain. He knows that they have to go back, eventually. Soon. He’s not sure he wants to be the one to break it.

He doesn’t have to.

“Hey, ‘Geta?”

Vegeta isn’t sure how much time has passed since they’d first settled when Goku speaks. The sun is long gone, giving way to the dim light of a crescent moon, and the stars are high and bright above their plateau. He’d closed his eyes at some point, and he finds himself blinking near-sleepily into some form of awareness, his hands alone in his lap. The pressure against Vegeta’s head lifts, and he turns to find Goku staring past him, his expression oddly distant. Vegeta furrows his brows, and even he isn’t sure if it’s out of annoyance or suspicion. “What?”

“D’you see that?” Goku asks, sounding curious. One of his hands squeezes at Vegeta’s thigh.

Vegeta turns to face the forest, to see what Goku might have seen, and it happens all too quickly: there’s a kiss against his cheek, quick and dirty, and Goku takes to the sky without warning.

“Last one to Capsule Corp’s a rotten egg,” he says, hovering above Vegeta in mocking.

Something deadly boils over in Vegeta as he stands, the remnants of sleepiness immediately quashed in favour of anger. “You interrupted my rest for  _ that,  _ you fucking  _ moron, _ ” Vegeta says, leaping up to the sky. Goku’s barely visible in front of him when he ascends, and he doesn’t hesitate to power up for extra speed as he follows him, swears bubbling out of his throat.

It’s the final touch on their routine, a neatly-tied bow on the end of a well-wrapped present. Describing it like that feels ingenuine, because there’s nothing neat about it—their routine isn’t organized, isn’t well-dressed, isn’t something pretty and easy on the eyes. It’s rough and light and brutal and freeing, something for their consumption only, something born of a missing piece that only a Saiyan knows and only they can understand. There’s no need to dress it up or make it look presentable: it’s  _ them _ at its essence, it’s  _ their  _ essence, and that’s enough.

There are many steps to their ritual, to their give and take, to their being.

Vegeta will never say it aloud, but he’s grateful for all of them.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are really appreciated. Thank you for reading!


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